Mohammed Rafi : God s Own Voice Hardcover – March 8, 2016

A stunning alternative look at the Genius called Mohammed Rafi - this book just takes you deep into the working life of Mohammed Rafi and the major impact he had on the film industry and all the individuals who would not be even known let alone recognised if it wasn't for Mohammed Rafi's talent. He helped put unknowns on the map with just a song that he sung irrelevant of the music directors status that gave them recognition they may not have had otherwise and quite often he did not charge them anything as they could not afford to hire "God's Own Voice".If the name Mohammed Rafi could be translated into many choice words it would look like this: Genius, Godly, Angel, Perfection, Humanity, decency, a way of life!The book gives you an insight that no one else has yet given including the recent book by his own son - which was good but very formulaic .This book talks about things which were not always made public, you actually find out about the people in the industry and what they felt about Rafi Saab - these were people who did not normally speak in public.The book is a must fro any one who worships Mohammed Rafi but also for those who ever doubted this wonderful creation of God named....Mohammed Rafi

As the sub-title of this book suggests, the book narrates an illustrated story of making of "God's Own Voice" in a subtle gentleman Mohammed Rafi. Rafi was born on 24 December 1924 to a working-class family in rural Punjab near Amritsar. While his family shifted to Lahore to run a small salon, his talent in music made him landing in Bombay to learn classical music, and pursue a career of a musician and film playback singer. He began with singing for radio stations. During the formative years of his career in the 1940s, he lent his voices to All India Radio as well as to Hindi film industry in Bombay. His life became a ‘rags-to-riches’ story, however, "like most singers who made it to the national consciousness, Rafi toiled by the sweat of his brow, never ever losing the larger focus" (p. 26). At the outset, the authors Raju Korti and Dhirendra Jain, make us understand Rafi’s larger focus, which was to become the voice that mesmerized millions. But, the journey to becoming an evergreen voice of Bollywood was not that smooth, rather rocky due to a fair amount of competition among the talents in the film industry. However, "by mid-1947, Rafi had become a household name in Hindi-speaking North India" (p. 33). His journey to eternity explores the multilingual singing talents of him, touching hearts of millions of Indians by singing in their vernaculars such as in Assamese, Konkani, Bhojpuri, Odia, Punjabi, Bengali, Marathi, Sindhi, Kannada, Gujarati, Telugu, Magahi, Maithili and Urdu. The book also throws lights on his intimate professional friendship with the contemporary music directors and playback singers such as Kishore Kumar, Sachin Dev Burman, Rahul Dev Burman, Lata Mangeshkar, Shankar-Jaikishan, and Asha Bhosle. The book also explores how Rafi lent his musical voices to a range of his filmy heroes in Bollywood that included Raj Kapoor, Shammi Kapoor, Rajendra Kumar, Pradeep Kumar, Joy Mukherjee, Dilip Kumar, Dharmendra, Dev Anand, Biswajit, and Bharat Bhushan. In a chapter, the authors then include a memoir by Rafi’s daughter Nasreen, where she describes him a caring family man. The book in the process becomes a nice read for the Rafi fans and music historians; although an indicative listing of his famous songs could be included in the book for the younger generation of readers.

This book was written by two fans of Rafi and it clearly shows - throughout the book we get - "Rafi is great, Rafi is so wonderful, Rafi is the best there is, there is no one like him, Everyone must bow to Rafi & call him the greatest and say they are nothing without him etc etc"There is nothing wrong with being a fan but i expected something better than just a fan's blind perspectiveThe book is especially hard on the fans of Mukesh, as I am, the authors go out of their way to mock and put down MukeshWhat was his crime? Well, Mukesh was the one singer that challenged the supremacy of Rafi that seems to bother the writers. Rafi must not be just No.1, no sir, he must be unchallenged and Mukesh committed that "crime"Contemporary singers of Rafi couldn't match Rafi - he was a far better singer - except for one, Manna Dey, but his voice did not match any of the top heroes and so he couldn't challenge RafiKishore, only Dev Anand preferred him, plus he was younger and so was not deemed a threatBut ah, Mukesh, was different - Big heroes like Raj Kapoor and Manoj Kumar actually preferred Mukesh over Rafi! How dare they?These authors went out of their way to put him down - it comes as a surprise to most of us who listened to the signature song of Sangam, "Dost, Dost Naa Raha" that this was the song of the movie. Not so, the authors inform us that since it was sung by Mukesh, it must not be, Rafi's, "Ee Mera Prem Patra" "is better and beat Mukesh". "Raj Kapoor privately admitted it" - there are a few more of these "privately admitted Rafi was better than Mukesh" examples in the bookThe authors' bias ruined the book for me and there was no need for thisNo one says Mukesh was better than Rafi, Rafi was the better classically trained singer and was the better singerBut no one is the best in everything - the pathos in Mukesh's voice is unmatched and like Kishore had a bigger, more commanding voiceAnd just as Manna Dey could not sing for everyone, not every hero thought Rafi suited their voiceUnlike the Mangeshkar sisters, Rafi had no problem sharing singing honors with his contemporaries, too bad the authors did not share his views